Patio Doors

I came up to the house for another solo weekend and had quite a big weekend! Last weekend I picked up some more lumber, drywall, and a set of sliding doors for the bedroom. Since I had the material on hand, Saturday morning I finished framing out the closet/bathroom walls between the closet and the bedroom. In this wall I put a door opening that will fit a door that I’ll be taking out from the hallway near the master bathroom. It’s just the right size for this closet door. I also buttoned up some remaining drywall nailer throughout the bedroom.

With that complete, I turned to the big project of the day – the sliding patio doors. Before the doors can get installed, I need to take out the existing door, windows, siding, and framing. Whoever installed the window trim – I think they were paid by the nail. There were sooo many nails. And to think, those nails were hand driven, not installed with a nail gun.

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With the demo complete, it was time to rework the framing. This gable wall is load bearing. It’s a minimal load, but it’s load bearing nonetheless. That means I’ll need to install a header to carry the load. For what it’s worth, the windows that were previously installed never had a header. But, I’m going to add one. This required some surgical precision in cutting out the existing cripple studs – the 2x4s over the opening. With the 2x4s cut back and the jack and king studs installed, I lifted the header up onto place. With a little persuasion from a framing hammer, it slipped right in.

On a side note, I went to school for building construction and had my own remodeling company for the better part of a decade. With that company I did a lot of structural renovations to houses which included working with engineers in taking out walls and installing beams. I’ve even jacked up a few houses. With that background, I’m confident in taking on structural projects like this one. I actually kind of enjoy structural work.

Patio door installation

Back on topic, I started the install of the vinyl sliding doors. I assembled the frame and then put the fixed and sliding panels in place. The sliding door was reversible (either right or left handed) and I had to make it the opposite of what it came as which requires swapping around the rollers and the latch assemblies. No problem. With the panels in place, I dry fit everything and wasn’t thrilled with how everything was working. Things that were supposed to line up didn’t quite line up which would lead to more installation problems if not corrected. Fortunately I did a dry run and located the problems and was able to make adjustments to make the door work as it should.

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With the doors installed and functional, I buttoned up the siding on the far side of the door. During the demo of the original opening, I was able to salvage a few pieces of siding. I also used some siding that had been salvaged from prior demolition projects. With that, I was able to infill down the side of the door. Once it’s trimmed out and painted, you’ll never know it wasn’t original. Well, you know what I mean…. And I guess I forgot to take a picture of the siding installed. Sorry!

Drywall Time

It was getting late in the day and I wasn’t feeling like getting covered in insulation (the exterior walls aren’t insulated yet) so I opted to start hanging drywall. I could hang the two interior walls without needing the insulation in place. So that’s what I did. I got the two walls hung just in time for the sunset. So what would any normal person do? Watch the sunset, right? It was spectacular. Not me, I was thinking, if I can get a coat of mud on, that’s less work that I have to do tomorrow. So back to work I went, taping and mudding away. At least I got to watch the beautiful sunset through the new doors. I finished first coating the two walls just in time to catch the tail end of the sunset.

First thing Sunday morning I got the exterior walls insulated. The walls were so much easier than the ceiling. It was a relief. After insulating, I hung drywall on the two outside walls. Once the drywall was hung, I pulled some more mud and put a first coat on all of the new drywall. I still had half a pan of mud (and you never put mud back into the bucket for risk of contaminating the bucket with particles of junk), so I started pulling a second coat of mud on the interior walls. Well, while I’m at it, let’s just go ahead and second coat everything on the interior walls. Good. Enough drywall for this weekend.

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Well that’s all for this weekend. Just kidding! As always, there’s more to do. I’m starting to move my lumber stash from my house to the shop up here. To do that, I’ve got to organize the shop and install a few lumber racks that I’ve got laying around. A few years back I ended up picking up a whole lot of hardwood lumber from a cabinet company that was closing their doors. I’ve got it stacked and stickered at my place, but it’s right in front of the main doorway into my shop (meaning it’s in the way). I’m looking to store it in the shop up here which means it’s out of the way yet it’s still accessible to me since I’m up here nearly every weekend. That’s a win/win. So I cleaned up the shop and mounted the few lumber racks that I had. I’ll be getting (or making) more racks as well as getting some scaffolding to put it on. This was load 1 of maybe 4 or 5. A quick estimate of this load puts the total around 750 board feet of lumber. For reference, our breakfast table that seats 4 people used around 30 board feet of lumber. With this load, I could make 25 breakfast tables!

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I’d like to throw out a thank you to Tom for coming by and mowing our yard. It’s much appreciated. I had a mobile mechanic come by this week and get our mower up and running. Turns out it was bad fuel. The bad fuel boogered up the fuel pump and the brand new carb. But he got it fixed and now it’s running. We also had a lawn care company get back to us (finally!). They can start this week. We’re holding out until we hear back from the company that Diana recommended to us but either way at least I know that the yard will be taken care of moving forward. And while we’re talking about the yard, I’m currently building out a campervan for the owner of a landscape nursery. Much of the work is being done on barter. That means that lots of good things are in store for the yard. Stay tuned!

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